


peach raspberry crisp

by levken



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-14
Updated: 2016-01-14
Packaged: 2018-05-13 22:31:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5719420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/levken/pseuds/levken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tsukasa can deal with this, he really, really….</p><p>..can’t. He simply can’t.</p>
            </blockquote>





	peach raspberry crisp

**Author's Note:**

> that's the name of the drink i stole from the secret starb*cks menu, anyway. while i was writing this i suddenly realized i had NO idea how making frappuccinos or anything works. sue me.
> 
> i think with writing leo i always have to sacrifice a little bit of my own shame and, honestly, i'm not always able to do that. it's like, why do you keep giving leo these weird skills in your writing that have no canon basis? it's character balance, okay? he can't possibly be that weird in canon without anything to back him up, right? right... right.
> 
> whatever. scold me for my characterization later. i wrote this overnight because my sleep schedule's messed up and i'm way too antsy to reread it myself and all of my friends who normally would are asleep. well, that's fine. fantastic, even. i'm not bitter at all!
> 
> in... any case, i hope you enjoy this and that you can ignore my 5:30am rambling in the notes.

“You can’t drink coffee black, can you?”

 

“I  _ can _ ,” Tsukasa chokes, half on the coffee and half on the lie. He swallows it down as fast as he can, grimacing at the bitter aftertaste as he tries to convince himself that he can get through the rest of the cup if he pretends it's sweeter. It’d be easier to manage if he could stop thinking about how Leo’s looking at him, always on the verge of grinning as if Tsukasa’s disgust is a funny joke, but of course he can’t. He can never ignore Leo, even when he tries.

(But it’s just because he’s so weird, okay?)

“Anyway.” He sets the mug down on one of the small, two-person tables they’d set up in their temporary base of sorts, pretending that he’s busying himself with the papers in front of him instead of trying to avoid drinking the rest of the coffee. “A coffee shop is… a weird concept, isn’t it? Did you okay this personally?”

Leo leans back in his chair as far as he can, the front legs of it lifting off the floor a little bit as he stares at Tsukasa, just stares, and Tsukasa doesn’t really get why he does that, but he never gets anything Leo does, anyway. He bites his tongue, waiting for the explanation that’s bound to come, because while he does understand how a coffee shop operates, he doesn’t really know if it’s up Knights’s alley. 

It takes so long for him to answer-- Tsukasa’s a patient kid, all things considered, but Leo’s the one person who can make him snap way more than he’d like to admit-- and when he finally does, he laughs out a short “Nope!” and lets the legs of the table meet the floor, a sharp  _ clack! _ following the collision. 

Tsukasa first looks around the makeshift cafe, to make sure they’re alone, and then underneath the table, instinctively checking for scratches on the tile. It’s not like he thinks Leo carries enough weight to actually manage that, but it’d drive him up the wall for something so simple to be messed up already, and Leo knows it. He should probably get onto him for that, but… 

“Oh,” he says instead. “Then who did?”

“Listen, newbie,” Leo points straight at him with his marker and Tsukasa wonders where he even got it, “when you’re in this industry, you don’t get to ‘okay’ things. You only get to nod your head and accept whatever’s thrown your way-- at least until you make it big. That’s how it works in this industry, don’t you know? Hahaha! Really, listen to me. I learned from the best!”

Tsukasa doesn’t ask who ‘the best’ is because he’s about ninety percent sure that Leo’d claim he learned from ‘the aliens.’ As much as he’s started to humor him, even Tsukasa has his limits, particularly when the subject has to do with extraterrestrials. 

“So… Kunugi-senpai gave the assignment to you? I guess he would just force it on us.” He can reason that much with himself, nodding thoughtfully as he looks over the papers. It’s not the first time a cafe theme has been run-- he briefly remembers the UNDEAD cafe that happened some time ago-- but this isn’t just a cafe. They’d be working the coffee machines, making the drinks themselves, and… he pales at the thought. Remembering their last run-in with cooking wasn’t something he wanted to do so soon and it’d been  _ months _ .

“No. Naru said she wanted to work with this theme! She was pretty insistent on it, actually. Said it’d be super cozy and everything! I’m fine with it, for the record, though I don’t know about ‘cozy.’ Hahaha, I wonder if Knights could ever do something like that?” Leo brings his hand up to his chin, dropping the marker on the table as (Tsukasa assumes) he attempts to visualize it for himself.

“But you said no one okay’d--”

And just like that, both of Leo’s palms are flat on the table again as he leans forward, looking Tsukasa in the eyes. “No. I said that you don’t okay things in this industry, not that no one actually did. I was testing you, actually, and to be honest with you, Tsubasa, your results weren’t all that great! Wahaha… it’s okay though! Since you have someone like me around to teach you the ropes, I’m sure you’ll learn!” 

Tsukasa sucks on the inside of his cheek, trying to convince himself that this is fine, Leader’s just messing around, and that there’s no reason for him to argue. Even if he’s being stupid, they’ll sort it out what they’re actually doing later when the rest of Knights is here, and that’ll be that. He can deal with this, he really, really….

..can’t. He simply can’t.

“Learn  _ what _ exactly?” Tsukasa doesn’t know when he raised his voice, but it’s hard not to forget yourself when dealing with Leo, he thinks. Or maybe that’s just him-- no, it can’t be. This isn’t a ‘special case’ situation or one of those things Arashi insists is because of something underlying; it’s just that he’s so unreasonable to everyone, Tsukasa included, and if no one else will stop him, then Tsukasa will have to step up to the plate! “It’s not like you have any area of  _ expertise _ here, anyway. Have you ever worked in a coffee shop? No, so I don’t know what exactly you think you can teach me…”

“Are you following me? I said I’d help you with the industry, not this!” Tsukasa swears if he has to hear Leo talk about the ‘industry’ one more time, he’ll lose it. He might be his senior and someone who’s more experienced due to his composing, but he’s also  _ only _ two years older than him. Besides, Tsukasa might not deal with the entertainment world himself, but he  _ is _ the heir to a well known family, so he’d like if Leo could doubt him a little less. “But… I probably have more experience than you with this sort of stuff too, now that I think about it! I mean, when’s the last time you tried to work a coffee machine, anyway? Practically never, right?”

Tsukasa goes silent--  _ whatever _ . Leo’s right, but for some reason he doesn’t want to say it; despite his constant irritation, it’s not like he actually hates Leo (far from it), so he normally feels fine with expressing his thoughts on the matter, but this feeling is different from irritation entirely-- it’s embarrassment. A bashful feeling brought up by the fact that he sort of feels lame for being unable to impress Leo with his surprising (and in actuality, _ lack of _ ) barista skills. 

Leo takes his silence as a confirmation and, as always, laughs it off, waving a hand as he stands up from the table. Tsukasa doesn’t know why he immediately looks at him upon hearing the chair move. He doesn’t want Leo to leave, even if he’ll see him later when they’re setting everything up, and he can’t think of a good reason for why he would follow him now, especially not when he doesn’t even know where he’s going. Still-- watching Leo take a step away from the table, he can’t stay quiet anymore, and instead offers only a barely audible plea, “Wait.”

“Wait?” Leo glances back at him, one hand resting on the edge of the table without turning to sit down again. “Why?” Tsukasa frowns, unable to reach a conclusion soon enough to avoid an awkward silence, but he’s lucky, because Leo’s not waiting for him anyway, and he speaks again, “Why would I wait? I’m going to show you how to make something good, you know? Come on already before I change my mind, Suoo! I’m a busy person-- I thought you knew!”

Oh.

“Oh,” Tsukasa says.

Wait.  _ What _ ?

He scrambles to his feet without meaning to, careful to make sure his abandoned coffee’s stable before stepping away as if that didn’t just happen. “Show me? You mean.. you  _ can _ make things in here?” It’s not as if Tsukasa had assumed Leo was completely unskilled in regards to things away from composing and idol activities and  _ sometimes _ archery, but… okay, he had, and he doesn’t know why he did, thinking back on it now.

Leo waves his hand as if to signal that it’s whatever, but it really isn’t, and Tsukasa knows that already. He waits for the bragging that never comes and instead gets the rarely calm response that he wasn’t expecting, “I like to make things for Ruka-tan sometimes.” He’s already behind the counter and Tsukasa follows now, standing a few steps away as he watches Leo gather the aprons.

“Ruka-tan--” he cuts himself off at Leo’s look, one he’s unused to but only ever shows up at the mention of their leader’s younger sister, and accepts the apron tossed at him, staring down at the fabric for a moment. Right. Of course they’d wear aprons in the kitchen; the chefs back home do this all the time, and he’s even done it for certain Knights events. This is something normal people do every day, he thinks as he slips the strings over his head, absentmindedly tying the ones behind his back. 

This is something  _ Leo _ does every day, he clarifies, and even though it’s just for his younger sister and a normal activity, it’s a look into Leader’s daily life, something he hadn’t exactly known he’d wanted before. Before he even realizes it himself, he’s looking up at Leo adjusting his own apron, gaze following nimble fingers making sure his ponytail’s tight enough. Tsukasa realizes now that he didn’t notice how much he observed his senior, either, but thankfully he catches himself staring before Leo does, clearing his throat to dismiss his own sudden shyness. 

“What?” Leo questions, looking up as he drops his hands to his sides, patting them casually. “Are you getting impatient with me, kid? Look,” he takes steps away to pull items out of a nearby cabinet, and even though Tsukasa’s always considered him to be someone irresponsible, it seems he’s the one to familiarize himself with their new setting first. “I’m working on it, alright? Hahaha, really, it’s not that hard to wait! You know, back when I was with the aliens, I had to learn that and…”

Tsukasa stops listening. Instead he simply watches, letting Leo talk about whatever he wants as he pours the right things into one of the cups used for preparation. Before he knows it, he’s not even paying attention to what he’s actually making, only catching the little things, like how he immediately knows what goes where when Tsukasa knows absolutely nothing, and how his hair being pulled back completely instead of to the side really shows off his profile that Tsukasa never got to fully appreciate before, and he even learns how he can be so completely and so easily fascinated by Leo’s lips moving without even attempting to read what he’s saying. 

He’s sure learning a lot today, and not a single thing he’s picked up actually has to do with coffee. His parents-- no, his entire family-- would be ashamed, he’s sure. He’d have to run away and give himself a new surname, one that he wouldn’t tarnish by being so easily distracted by another  _ boy _ of all things. Briefly he wonders what would sound good-- something normal, something average that no one would ever suspect came as a result of a name change, like Tanaka or Watanabe or Tsukina--

_ Uh _ .

His common sense finally catches up with his thoughts and then shortly afterward he catches up with reality, unable to stall for so long, especially when he’s pretty sure Leo’s almost done, judging by the sound of the whipped cream can being shook. Tsukasa coughs again, this time to remind himself that, yeah, he’s standing here next to Leo and not off alone in his room where he can think whatever he want. 

Leo ignores him this time, settling for creating a whipped cream masterpiece ( _ monstrosity _ , Tsukasa corrects in his head), his tongue sticking out of his mouth as he focuses on making it just perfect. Tsukasa waits, deciding it’s better than interrupting him, and when he’s sure Leo’s done, he takes a step closer to peer at his creation that looks… surprisingly, normal. Except for the colour, that is.

“It’s… _ pink _ ,” Tsukasa comments, distaste flooding his tone, and Leo just grins at him, looking between the frappuccino and him. The amount of whipped cream is a little overboard, too, but he blames himself for letting Leo stack that much on top-- it’s practically  _ overflowing _ .

“I told you I usually make this for Ruka-tan! She really likes it, though. And besides,” Leo shoots a pointed glance back at their table, “I figured you aren’t so good with bitter things, right?” Tsukasa crosses his arms over his chest at that-- how had he given himself away to someone so dense?-- and sighs, deciding to accept defeat for now.

“Well… what’s in it, anyway?” He wrinkles his nose, trying to seem at least a little reluctant, though honestly, he can’t help but to be curious about what kind of coffee Leader could ever make. He didn’t take him for someone who’d be good in the kitchen, but… a good brother, he can accept, and a good older brother, according to all the television shows he’d be exposed to recently, can take care of his younger sister’s needs.

“Vanilla bean,” Leo lists, even though it’s sort of lost on Tsukasa, “raspberry syrup, peach syrup, whipped cream, radioactive waste--” he pauses as Tsukasa scoffs, “--I’m kidding!  _ Soooorry _ . You don’t have to look so sour about it. It’s like something came up and bit you from behind, Tsuna! Did I forget something-- the cherry on top?” He finally places the whipped cream can back on the counter and proceeds to turn on Tsukasa with an expectant look that he can’t place. “So, did you actually learn something from all of that talking or did you just stare at me the whole time? I guess either’s okay!”

Oh, right. Right, he was supposed to be following what he said-- wait. ‘Stare at him the whole time’? Tsukasa can feel the temperature in the room increasing before he can actually realize that,  _ wait _ , that’s not coming from the thermostat, it’s his own face, and it’s probably not something Leo can even feel at all-- it’s only something that can be seen on his face, an embarrassing pink matching Leo’s previous creation. 

He doesn’t know when Leo managed to back him into the counter until it’s pressing into his back and Tsukasa raises a defensive hand, stumbling on his unspoken words as he tries to come up with an excuse. “I wasn’t staring at you,” he says at first, but his guilty conscience calls him out on that before Leo does. “I mean. I was, but.” Great. He’s lost. He doesn’t have an excuse; if he were Sena-senpai, an insult would work here, but he’s not and he can’t use that-- he’s an actually decent person, after all. “How… how did you  _ know _ , Leader?”

“Intuition.” That’s something Narukami-senpai would say, Tsukasa knows, but it doesn’t really fit on Leo. “I gained it when the aliens took me in.” Ah, that’s more like it. “You’ll gain it…  _ never _ , at this rate, just so you know.” He’s keeping his gaze level with Tsukasa’s purposely, and if Tsukasa wasn’t so offended, he’d look away.

“I  _ do _ have intuition! More than you do, anyway, Leader.” 

“Haha,” Leo’s grinning again, which for some reason washes away all of Tsukasa’s anger, replacing it with the same embarrassment from before-- ugh, “hahaha. Really? Then what do you think I’m going to do right now? To make up for all that staring? You tell  _ me _ the right answer, Tsukki.”

For once, Tsukasa doesn’t even notice the name mistake (and that’s probably a good thing-- won’t this get someone in trouble with copyrights? Whatever) in his struggle to find something appropriate to say. Okay. They’re really close, for one. Tsukasa doesn’t know why Leo thought it’d be a good idea to bring his face so near, but this can’t actually be happening, right? For two, his staring from before had totally been out of… well, attraction, honestly. To make up for that, it’s.. 

There’s no other answer than the most embarrassing one, is there? Sure, it’s not like it’s something Tsukasa hadn’t thought about before-- though all thoughts of it before had only  _ ever _ been for a few seconds, he promises!-- but actually saying it is another thing entirely.. If there’s no other way, though, maybe he can manage. Just maybe.

He swallows hard, cursing Leo internally for making him say it, and looks away. “Um. Kiss… me?” It sounds so much more terrible out loud, but he had to say it! He couldn’t sit there and rot, letting Leo get the best of him forever, could he? Besides, he was totally prompted into this, wasn’t he?

“What?”

Oh God. He’d ruined everything, hadn’t he? That wasn’t what Leo was thinking at all, so how could Tsukasa come to that conclusion? Intuition who-- he’d apparently never heard of her! He prepares to laugh it off, but Leo beats him to the punch, which makes the situation entirely  _ worse _ .

And Leo keeps laughing, not stopping even when Tsukasa looks back at him with a glare, pausing only to speak, and Tsukasa’s already dreading that, “No, that’s not what I was going to do. I was going to challenge you to a staring contest, but--  _ haha _ \-- maybe you’re right! Maybe that would make more sense.” Well, Tsukasa’s lost by now; he says nothing, which is okay though, because Leo’s never ever finished, is he? “Sheesh. I guess I was wrong about you.. you really do have some sort of intuition!” Okay, he’s pretty sure that by now they’re misusing the word by a long shot, but whatever. “I seriously can’t believe you were right!”

Tsukasa wants to argue that this isn’t the first time he’s been right, just so Leo knows it, but he realizes first that if he’s right, that means Leo’s going to.. wait. Wait, no. He’s not emotionally prepared for this-- he’s only  _ fifteen _ , after all, and it’s totally normal for boys his age to not have experienced kissing yet, right?  _ God help him _ \-- but he doesn’t get the time to confess that. 

Leo’s already leaning in and, without really thinking about it, he does too, tilting his head so he can meet Leo’s lips with his own easier, something he hadn’t known was an instinctual thing until now (maybe television’s to thank again-- he’ll consider that later). One of his hands fist into the front of Leo’s apron without any thought being put into it, but he finds that’s the perfect place for it to be as he pulls his senior closer to him, unsure exactly of what he’s reaching for but knowing that he doesn’t want to stop until he gets it. 

Unfortunately, when it comes down to necessities, breathing comes first, and he  _ does _ have to stop, pulling away from Leo only moments before Leo himself needs to. This isn’t a competition, he reminds himself, trying not to think about how he wishes his breath holding capacity was longer than Leo’s and instead focusing on a taste he can’t quite place, but it’s on the tip of his tongue and it certainly isn’t Leo.

He’s caught in his thinking before he can place it, and as Leo doesn’t bother to lean away, apparently unaware of social boundaries and personal space, he decides to be merciful enough to explain it. “It’s the frappuccino,” he clarifies, and it clicks. “I tried it earlier while making it. Good, riiight? I knew you’d like it.”

“I...” Tsukasa doesn’t get any farther than that. In the back of his mind (since the rest of it is preoccupied with thoughts of an irresponsible leader, unfortunately), he thinks he hears a bell, and for a moment he hopes that it might be Jesus Christ himself, coming to scold Tsukasa and set him back on track before he can even consider kissing Leo again. It’s not, though, and it instead turns out to be an actual bell-- the one assigned to the door so they’re notified when future customers enter-- judging by the fact that a voice follows immediately after, one he knows too well and that’s also thoroughly unimpressed.

“What the  _ hell _ \-- you shitty brat, you--” Izumi stops, apparently unaware of how to address the situation. Tsukasa has to give him credit for that; he doesn’t exactly know how to recognize it, either. “I thought I  _ said _ there couldn’t be any flirting in the clubroom, you know. What exactly do you take us for, anyway?”

“Secchan, it’s not the clubroom. Besides,  _ you’re _ not really one to talk…” another voice interrupts, starting the natural chaos that comes with any Knights meeting. 

 

Tsukasa takes that as an opportunity to move away as Leo joins in, busying himself with the drink from earlier and decidedly anything that  _ isn’t _ Leo, because God knows he’s the only person Tsukasa will be thinking about later.

**Author's Note:**

> i changed my mind, don't scold me!!!!!!!!!!!!! i realize my mistakes and apologize!!!!! okay, just kidding. but seriously! i hope you enjoyed this / were at least a little bit okay with it. thanks for reading, if you did! also.. i appreciate kudos/comments more than anything, jsyk :D 
> 
> p.s. i'm sorry that i'm terrible at ending fics, but you know, i'm working on it! promise!
> 
> p.p.s. i can't believe i didn't say this before, but god, i just love leotsu so much. don't you? i want to write them forever but my laziness prohibits that. WHAT-EVER, self. okay, enough of me. this is starting to get secondhand embarrassing, isn't it?


End file.
